"Major-General's Song ""I Am the Very Model of a Modern Major-General"" (often referred to as the ""Major-General's Song"" or ""Modern Major-General's Song"") is a patter song from Gilbert and Sullivan's 1879 comic opera ""The Pirates of Penzance"". It is perhaps the most famous song in Gilbert and Sullivan's operas. Sung by Major General Stanley at his first entrance, towards the end of Act I, the character introduces himself by presenting his résumé and admitting to a few shortcomings. The song satirises the idea of the ""modern"" educated British Army officer of the latter 19th century. It is difficult to perform"
"musical ""Hamilton"" by Lin-Manuel Miranda, refers to himself with irony as ""The model of a modern major general"", which he rhymes with ""men are all"" and ""pedestal"". Miranda commented: ""I always felt like 'mineral' wasn't the best possible rhyme."" Stephen Colbert opined that some verses of ""Favorite Song"" by rap artist Chance the Rapper (featuring Childish Gambino), utilize the same rhythm as the Major-General's Song. Notes Sources Parodies: Major-General's Song ""I Am the Very Model of a Modern Major-General"" (often referred to as the ""Major-General's Song"" or ""Modern Major-General's Song"") is a patter song from Gilbert and Sullivan's 1879 comic"
"of the popular general Sir Garnet Wolseley. The biographer Michael Ainger, however, doubts that Gilbert intended a caricature of Wolseley, identifying instead the older General Henry Turner, an uncle of Gilbert's wife whom Gilbert disliked, as a more likely inspiration for the satire. Nevertheless, in the original London production, George Grossmith imitated Wolseley's mannerisms and appearance, particularly his large moustache, and the audience recognised the allusion. Wolseley himself, according to his biographer, took no offence at the identification and sometimes sang ""I am the very model of a modern Major-General"" for the private amusement of his family and friends. <poem>I"
"Campbell's Soup and a 2011 Geico commercial in which a couple that wants to save money, but still listen to musicals, finds a roommate, dressed as the Major-General, who awkwardly begins the song while dancing on a coffee table. Gimbels department store had a campaign sung to the tune of the Major-General's Song that began, ""We are the very model of a modern big department store."" George Washington, in the number ""Right Hand Man"" from the 2015 musical ""Hamilton"" by Lin-Manuel Miranda, refers to himself with irony as ""The model of a modern major general"", which he rhymes with ""men"
"are all"" and ""pedestal"". Miranda commented: ""I always felt like ‘mineral’ wasn’t the best possible rhyme."" Other film references to ""Pirates"" include ""Kate & Leopold"", where there are multiple references, including a scene where Leopold sings ""I Am The Very Model of A Modern Major-General"" while accompanying himself on the piano; and in ""Pretty Woman"", Edward Lewis (Richard Gere) covers a social gaffe by prostitute Vivian Ward (Julia Roberts), who comments that the opera ""La traviata"" was so good that she almost ""peed [her] pants"", by saying that she had said that she liked it better than ""The Pirates of"
"caricature of Wolseley, identifying instead General Henry Turner, uncle of Gilbert's wife, as the pattern for the ""modern Major-General"". Gilbert disliked Turner, who, unlike the progressive Wolseley, was of the old school of officers. Nevertheless, in the original London production, George Grossmith imitated Wolseley's mannerisms and appearance, particularly his large moustache, and the audience recognised the allusion. Wolseley himself, according to his biographer, took no offence at the caricature and sometimes sang ""I am the very model of a modern Major-General"" for the private amusement of his family and friends. On the coast of Cornwall, during Queen Victoria's reign, Frederic"
"wrote ""Please Hello"" for ""Pacific Overtures"" (1976), a song that has been called ""an homage"" to Gilbert. Yip Harburg said, ""Perhaps my first great literary idol was W. S. Gilbert. ... Gilbert's satirical quality entranced us [Harburg and Ira Gershwin] – his use of rhyme and meter, his light touch, the marvelous way his words blended with Sullivan's music. A revelation!"" In the number ""Right Hand Man"" from the 2015 musical ""Hamilton"" by Lin-Manuel Miranda, George Washington refers to himself with irony as ""The model of a modern major general"", which he rhymes with ""men are all"" and ""pedestal"". Miranda"
"Gilbert and Sullivan collaboration and introduced the much-parodied ""Major-General's Song"". The opera was performed for over a century by the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company in Britain and by many other opera companies and repertory companies worldwide. Modernized productions include Joseph Papp's 1981 Broadway production, which ran for 787 performances, winning the Tony Award for Best Revival and the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Musical, and spawning many imitations and a 1983 film adaptation. ""Pirates"" remains popular today, taking its place along with ""The Mikado"" and ""H.M.S. Pinafore"" as one of the most frequently played Gilbert and Sullivan operas. ""The Pirates"
"under John Major, sent up Tony Blair in a parody of ""When I Was a Lad"" from ""Pinafore"". In October 2010, Ron Butler released a YouTube video pastiche of the Major-General's Song in character as, and mildly lampooning, President Obama. US Supreme Court Justice William Rehnquist, a lifelong fan of Gilbert and Sullivan, quoted lyrics from the operas in law cases, parodied the lyrics in his writings at the Court and added gold stripes to his judicial robes after seeing them used by the Lord Chancellor in a production of ""Iolanthe"". The Lord Chancellor Lord Falconer, on the other side"
"a Matter of Patter"", consisting mostly of Gilbert and Sullivan songs and dialogue and his own anecdotes‚ which he has performed with his wife in the United Kingdom‚ South Africa and the Middle East. Suart has also appeared in three semi-staged productions at The Proms, in ""The Gondoliers"" (1997), ""Iolanthe"" (2000) and ""H.M.S. Pinafore"" (2005); all three performances were broadcast live on BBC Radio 3 and the former two were recorded for later broadcast, in abridged form, on BBC television. In 2012, he appeared in Gilbert and Sullivan's last opera, ""The Grand Duke"". Among Suart's numerous recordings are Giovanni Battista"
"works of Gilbert and Sullivan at major theatres and concert halls throughout the United Kingdom and in France, Germany, Holland, Spain, New York, Bermuda, the Far East and aboard the QE2 on the World Cruise. He was a principal baritone with the Regency Opera Company in ""Tosca"" and ""The Marriage of Figaro"" (1986), English Festival Opera's ""La boheme"" (1995) and Pimlico Opera's tour of ""La Traviata"", as well as baritone soloist in the ""Magic of Broadway"" in Yarmouth and ""Iolanthe"" for Opera Options at Hever Castle. He also performed Mountararat in ""Iolanthe"" and Mentchikoff in ""The Count of Luxembourg"" in"
"of Bagdad"" (1858) as a prototype of the later Gilbert and Sullivan model. W. S. Gilbert wrote several opera parodies before he moved on to comic operas with Arthur Sullivan. Sullivan was also familiar with Italian opera and included a patter song in his first comic opera, ""Cox and Box"" (1867). George Bernard Shaw, in his capacity as a music critic, praised ""the time-honored lilt which Sir Arthur Sullivan, following the example of Mozart and Rossini, chose for the lists of accomplishments of the Major-General in The Pirates or the Colonel in Patience."" Well-known examples of rapid-fire, tongue-tripping Gilbert and"
"the company. A 2006 review commented that ""Ross, in his 27th season with the company, underplays the Major-General masterfully—snappy, energetic, not too mannered. ... [His] grand and hilarious [entrance] scene, especially at the insouciantly zippy tempo Ross takes, provided a lift and exhilaration I haven't felt in a while from any musical performance."" Ross has received many warm reviews for his portrayal of the famous Gilbert & Sullivan ""patter"" roles and other baritone roles in the Savoy operas. At the International Gilbert and Sullivan Festival in Buxton, England, he played the role of Rudolph in the company's ""The Grand Duke"""
"am the very model of a modern Major-General, I've information vegetable, animal, and mineral, I know the kings of England, and I quote the fights historical From Marathon to Waterloo, in order categorical; I'm very well acquainted, too, with matters mathematical, I understand equations, both the simple and quadratical, About binomial theorem I'm teeming with a lot o' news, (""bothered for a rhyme"") With many cheerful facts about the square of the hypotenuse. I'm very good at integral and differential calculus; I know the scientific names of beings animalculous: In short, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral, I am the"
"for coloratura, ""Poor wand'ring one"", which is generally thought to burlesque Gounod's waltz-songs, though the music critic of ""The Times"" called it ""mock-Donizetti"". In a scene in Act II, Mabel addresses the police, who chant their response in the manner of an Anglican church service. Sullivan even managed to parody two composers at once. The critic Rodney Milnes describes the Major-General's Act II song, ""Sighing softly to the river"", ""as plainly inspired by – and indeed worthy of – Sullivan's hero Schubert"", and Amanda Holden speaks of the song's ""Schubertian water-rippling accompaniment"", but adds that it simultaneously spoofs Verdi's ""Il"
"the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company restored one of the original versions of the finale, which finishes with a variation of ""I am the very model of a modern major-general"", rather than with the customary reprise of ""Poor wand'ring one"", but in later revivals, it reverted to the more familiar text. ""The Pirates of Penzance"" has been one of Gilbert and Sullivan's most popular comic operas. After its unique triple opening in 1879–80, it was revived in London at the Savoy Theatre in 1888 and in 1900, and for the Savoy's repertory season of 1908–09. In the British provinces, the D'Oyly"
"made other minor changes in the score. The ""Matter Patter"" trio from ""Ruddigore"" and ""Sorry her lot"" from ""H.M.S. Pinafore"", two other Gilbert and Sullivan operas, were interpolated into the show. The production also restored Gilbert and Sullivan's original New York ending, with a reprise of the Major-General's song in the Act II finale. Linda Ronstadt starred as Mabel, Rex Smith as Frederic, Kevin Kline as the Pirate King, Patricia Routledge as Ruth (replaced by Estelle Parsons for the Broadway transfer), George Rose as the Major-General, and Tony Azito as the Sergeant of Police. Kline won a Tony Award for"
"couple that wants to save money, but still listen to musicals, finds a roommate, dressed as the Major General, who awkwardly begins the song while dancing on a coffee table. Similarly, Martyn Green sang a pastiche of the song listing all of the varieties of Campbell's Soup. Another prominent example is the elaborate illustrated book, called ""My Goodness! My Gilbert and Sullivan!"" of parodies of Gilbert's lyrics advertising Guinness stout. The likenesses (often in costume) of, or endorsements by, numerous Gilbert and Sullivan performers were used in advertising throughout the decades. Trading cards were also created, using images from some"
"""Pinafore"", Major-General Stanley in ""Pirates"", Major Murgatroyd in ""Patience"", Private Willis in ""Iolanthe"", the Mikado and Pooh-Bah in ""The Mikado"", Old Adam and Sir Roderic Murgatroyd in ""Ruddigore"", Sergeant Meryll in ""Yeomen"", Captain Corcoran, KCB in ""Utopia"" and the Herald in ""The Grand Duke"", and as well as directing, coaching, and conducting master classes concerning the Savoy operas. He also appeared on cruise ships and with Hinge and Bracket and sang for many years with the Derby Cathedral Choir. From 1996 to 2008, he played several roles with the National Gilbert & Sullivan Opera Company and other companies at the"
"a tablet at St Michael and All Angels Church in Colwich, Staffordshire, a short distance from Shugborough Hall and Wolseley Park at Colwich, near Rugeley. The church was the burial place of the Wolseley baronets of Wolseley Park, the ancestral home of the Wolseley family. W. S. Gilbert, of the musical partnership Gilbert and Sullivan, deliberately modelled the character of Major-General Stanley in the operetta ""The Pirates of Penzance"" on Wolseley, as did George Grossmith, the actor who first created the role in the opening theatrical run. In another of Gilbert and Sullivan's operettas, ""Patience"", Colonel Calverley praises Wolseley in"
"Simon Gilbert (tenor) Simon Gilbert (born 6 October 1937 in Hendon, London) is an English actor and tenor. At the age of twenty one he took singing lessons with the teachers of the Australian soprano Joan Sutherland. Gilbert gradually gravitated towards Opera and The Edinburgh Festival, where sang with Sutherland (in Haydn’s ""Orfeo"") and Luciano Pavarotti (in ""I Capuleti e i Montecchi""). In 1967, he sang with Scottish Opera, for example appearing in ""L'anima del filosofo"". Joining The Adelphi Theatre's company for the musical ""Show Boat"", he played lead man to the show's star, Cleo Laine. In 1972, he was"
"production of Gilbert and Sullivan's ""H.M.S. Pinafore"" to raise funds to get it unstuck. Much of the musical consists of a play within a play, as the company presents a musically updated version of the Gilbert and Sullivan opera; the boat pilot (played by Bill Robinson in the original production) takes a major role as Sir Joseph Porter, First Lord of the Admiralty. Another actor (Avon Long in the original) sings and dances the role of Captain Corcoran, while the part of Josephine goes to an Andrews Sisters-style trio of women from the company chorus (Sheila Guyse, Ida James, and"
"The libretto does contain considerable humour, including a lot of pun-laden one-liners, but Gilbert's trademark satire and topsy-turvy plot complications are subdued in comparison with the other Gilbert and Sullivan operas. The dialogue, though in prose, is quasi-Shakespearean, or early modern English, in style. Critics considered the score to be Sullivan's finest, including its overture, which is in sonata form, rather than being written as a sequential pot-pourri of tunes from the opera, as in most of the other Gilbert and Sullivan overtures. This was the first Savoy Opera to use Sullivan's larger orchestra, including a second bassoon and third"
"very model of a modern Major-General. I know our mythic history, King Arthur's and Sir Caradoc's; I answer hard acrostics, I've a pretty taste for paradox, I quote in elegiacs all the crimes of Heliogabalus, In conics I can floor peculiarities parabolous; I can tell undoubted Raphaels from Gerard Dows and Zoffanies, I know the croaking chorus from ""The Frogs"" of Aristophanes! Then I can hum a fugue of which I've heard the music's din afore, (""bothered for a rhyme"") And whistle all the airs from that infernal nonsense ""Pinafore"". Then I can write a washing bill in Babylonic cuneiform,"
"but I sang quite well."" There he helped organise amateur performances of various Gilbert and Sullivan operas. The first of these was ""The Gondoliers"", in which he played the role of the Duchess. The tutors called his performance a great success, and he was given a position within the men's chorus in the next piece, ""Iolanthe"". Over the next few years, he took part in ""The Mikado"" as a member of the chorus, and then appeared as the Major-General in ""The Pirates of Penzance"". It was a period which he later acknowledged as being the start of his career. When"
"operas with the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, including the roles of Plaintiff in ""Trial"" (1975), Nekaya in ""Utopia"" (1976), Julia in ""The Grand Duke"" (1976), Casilda in ""The Gondoliers"" (1977), and Laetitia Grinder in ""The Zoo"" (1978), and excerpts from ""The Gondoliers"" and ""Ruddigore"" in a 1970 recording with the company called ""Songs and Snatches"". Julia Goss Julia Goss (born c. 1946), is a Scottish singer and actress best known for her performances in the principal soprano roles of the Gilbert and Sullivan operas with the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company. She joined that company in 1967, remaining with them until"
"the leading lady, Nancy McIntosh, and refused to write another piece featuring her; Gilbert insisted that she must appear in his next opera. Instead, Sullivan teamed up again with his old partner, F. C. Burnand. ""The Chieftain"" (1894), a heavily revised version of their earlier two-act opera, ""The Contrabandista"", flopped. Gilbert and Sullivan reunited one more time, after McIntosh announced her retirement from the stage, for ""The Grand Duke"" (1896). It failed, and Sullivan never worked with Gilbert again, although their operas continued to be revived with success at the Savoy. In May 1897 Sullivan's full-length ballet, ""Victoria and Merrie"
"trovatore"", with the soloist unaware of a concealed male chorus singing behind him. Writing about patter songs, Shaw, in his capacity as a music critic, praised ""the time-honored lilt which Sir Arthur Sullivan, following the example of Mozart and Rossini, chose for the lists of accomplishments of the Major-General in The Pirates or the Colonel in Patience."" This opera contains two well-known examples of Sullivan's characteristic combination of two seemingly disparate melodies. Jacobs suggests that Berlioz's ""La damnation de Faust"", a great favourite in Sullivan's formative years, may have been the model for Sullivan's trademark contrapuntal mingling of the rapid"
"the Great Quack"". This was not intended to be sung at great speed and is thus more of a precursor of, for example, ""When I, good friends, was called to the bar"" (""Trial by Jury"") or ""As some day it may happen"" (""The Mikado""), than are the examples of the ""rapid-fire"" patter above. Most of the Gilbert and Sullivan patter songs are solos for the principal comedian in the cast and were originally performed by George Grossmith. Anna Russell's ""How to write your own Gilbert and Sullivan Opera"" contains an affectionate parody of a Gilbert and Sullivan patter song. Apart"
"cantata. He informs Sullivan that, if he would get around to finishing ""The Golden Legend"", Queen Victoria will attend the premiere. Likewise, when Gilbert calls on Sullivan, he sees him rehearsing ""The Golden Legend"", as Bennett stands watch. When Bennett dozes off, Sullivan turns back to ""The Mikado"". After both works debut, Sullivan is knighted. The Queen inquires if he will write a grand opera. Just before the premiere of their next opera, ""Ruddigore"", Sullivan asks Gilbert to write the libretto for his first grand opera. Gilbert declines, stating that in such a work the words play second fiddle to"
"by a quote from Franz Schubert's ""The Erl-King"" and also parodies the opera ""Il Trovatore"". Jacobs notes that Sullivan also adds his own humorous touches to the music by setting commonplace expressions in ""Donizettian recitative"". But on the serious side, he enhances the moments of true emotional climax, as in Josephine's Act II aria, and added musical interest to concerted numbers by ""subtly shifting the rhythms and bar groupings."" During rehearsals for the original production, Gilbert added a ballad for Captain Corcoran in which he urged his daughter to forget the common sailor with whom she is in love, because"
"in the Mugar Memorial Library at Boston University. Martyn Green William Martin Green (22 April 1899 – 8 February 1975), first appearing professionally as William Martyn Green and later best known as Martyn Green, was an English actor and singer. He is best known for his work as principal comedian in the Gilbert & Sullivan comic operas, which he performed and recorded with the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company and other troupes. After army service in World War I, Green studied singing and began to perform in musical theatre. In 1922, he joined the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company playing in the"
"from Gilbert and Sullivan tunes set to different words, such as Tom Lehrer's listing of the chemical elements to the tune of the Major General's Song, later patter songs can be found in early twentieth-century operettas, such as Edward German's ""Merrie England"" and in a number of musicals. Later examples include ""Tchaikovsky (and Other Russians)"" in Ira Gershwin and Kurt Weill's ""Lady in the Dark"" and ""Getting Married Today"" in Stephen Sondheim's ""Company"". Another of many examples from musical theatre is Professor Harold Hill's song in ""The Music Man"", ""Ya Got Trouble"". Patter song The patter song is characterised by"